Il Castello dei Visconti e degli Sforza

Love and hate for the Castle

For centuries the Milanese considered the castle to be an emblem of both tyranny and foreign domination and accordingly attempted to assault and demolish the reviled fortress on various occasions. Only after the unification of Italy and its conversion to a cultural centre did the castle truly become dear to the hearts of the Milanese and as such, a symbol of the city.

The Visconti fort of “Porta Giovia”

Between 1360 and 1370, having become the Lord of western Milan, Galeazzo Visconti II built a fort straddling the medieval wall and encasing the postern of Porta Giovia or Zobia. His successor, Gian Galeazzo, added barracks for the troops in 1392. The two parts of the building were divided by a medieval defensive structure, the so-called dead moat and would only be united under the reign of Filippo Maria, the last of the Viscontis. It was in this period that the castle, the largest of those built by the Viscontis, was adopted as the family's official residence. At the time, the square plan castle was 180 metres in length, fortified with four square towers and delimited by a defensive wall. The uncultivated fields to the north-west were transformed into a large garden known as a “zardinum” or “barcho”.

The last member of the dynasty spent a solitary existence here, confining himself with his court within his immense abode, where he died leaving no heirs. His only daughter, Bianca Maria, legitimised by Emperor Sigismund in 1426, was married to the military leader Francesco Sforza, upon whom Filippo Maria Visconti had relied to defend the Duchy from the Venetians.

In 1447, upon the death of Filippo Maria, the people of Milan proclaimed the Ambrosian Republic and partially damaged the residence of Porta Giovia, the emblem of Ducal power.

The grey Serizzo stone batters in the dead moat and on the external walls of the Rocchetta Keep and the Ducal Court are today all that remain of the Visconti fortress.

The rise of the Sforza Castle

Originally from Romagna, Francesco Sforza was an immensely capable military leader as well as an astute politician. Having previously been hired to defend the city by Filippo Maria Visconti, he successfully laid siege to Milan and was welcomed by the populace as a liberator. On the 25th March 1450, Sforza and his wife Bianca Maria Visconti were hailed as the rulers of Milan.

Once in power, Francesco Sforza immediately set to work building additions to the Visconti Castle. Knowing the hatred the Milanese had for the building, he justified its reconstruction on the basis of a desire to beautify the city while defending it from outside enemies.

Coherently with this line of reasoning, in 1452, he set a civil engineer, the Florentine Antonio Averulino, known as il Filarete, to work alongside the military engineers, Giovanni da Milano, Jacopo da Cortona and Marcoleone da Nogolarolo. Averulino was tasked with designing the façade on the side of the city and the high central tower that rose above the castle gate. The Tuscan architect, however, was soon dismissed and the project was headed by Bartolomeo Gadio, a military architect who had the trust of the Sforzas and who had taken up the post of fortress commissioner for the duchy in the same year. The original plans for the façade were modified by Gadio to include two massive round corner towers covered in diamond shaped Serizzo stone that was more resistant to the artillery of the time. On the other side of the castle he also fortified and extended the “Ghirlanda”, a pre-existing Visconti era wall, which together with its two corner towers and a covered road, constituted the northern defences.

The efforts to complete and embellish the castle were intensified under the rule of Francesco Sforza's successor. In 1468 Galeazzo Maria, the first in line to the title, moved into the castle together with his court and spouse, Bona di Savoia, the sister-in-law of King Louis XI of France. In a matter of just a few years the Rocchetta Keep and the Ducal Courtyard were completed, the castle rooms frescoed and the Ducal Chapel decorated.

At this time the Castle was composed of the buildings that surrounded the capacious Courtyard of Arms on the side of the city, and the Ducal Apartments and fortified Rocchetta Keep towards the park.

Ludovico il Moro

In December 1476 Galeazzo Maria fell victim to a conspiracy and was assassinated. His widow, Bona di Savoia, became regent on behalf of the young Duke, Gian Galeazzo Maria. She retreated with her son to the central tower, which she raised in order to control the entire castle, and which to this day still carries her name.

Her regency however was not to last, Galeazzo Maria's brother, Ludovico Maria, known as il Moro, soon took power and sent Bona into exile. A connoisseur of the arts, il Moro transformed the court of Milan into one of the most refined of the time, with artists such as Donato Bramante and Leonardo da Vinci benefiting from his patronage. Among the masterpieces that stand as a testament to his reign are Leonardo's Sala delle Asse and the decoration of the Treasure Room that the Duke commissioned of Bartolomeo Suardi, also known as il Bramantino in 1490.

The projects to render the castle ever more sumptuous were interrupted in 1497, when, contemporaneously his spouse, Beatrice d'Este died in childbirth and the French troops marched upon Milan. The Duke made preparations to resist the impending attack by cleaning out the moats, covering the ravelins (fortifications for the gates), filling the castle walls, and gathering supplies, ammunition and artillery. Fearing also a popular uprising il Moro decided to seek refuge at the court of the Habsburg Emperor Maximilian I, leaving the castle governor in charge of defending the fortress. After a series of vicissitudes, he eventually reconquered Milan in 1500. Ludovico il Moro died a prisoner in France in 1508.